Kom Ed-Dhab. Gergory Marouard
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KOM ED-DAHAB KOM ED-DAHAB 2015 PRELIMINARY REPORT Gregory Marouard Survey at Kom ed-Dahab The site at Kom ed-Dahab, Menzala Lake, Damietta Inspectorate, is currently an isolated island in the proximity of the western shore of Lake Menzala (fig. 1), which has so far never been the object of any archaeological fieldwork or precise mapping. Situated about 12 km south of Damietta and about 12 km to the east of Faraskur at the GPS coordinates 31°18.50ˊN–31°49.54ˊE. The site is registered by the MSA in the region of Daqahliya (Damietta Inspectorate) under the number 050105. The maximum extension of the emerged area measures about 780 × 820 m. The island is circular in shape and has two triangular protrusions on the northern and the southwestern sides. The northern extension is clearly separated from the main site by a flooded area about 120 m long and 80 m wide. The archaeological remains cover an area of about 32 hectares. Be- Figure 1. Map of the Egyptian Delta with the location of the Kom ed-Dahab in the Eastern Delta (map: G. Marouard) 2015–2016 ANNUAL REPORT 109 KOM ED-DAHAB cause it is still surrounded by water and reeds and can only be accessed by boat, this important settlement located about 2 km from the lake shore was completely untouched before 2015. The site at Kom ed-Dahab is an early Roman town and an ex-nihilo foundation, which appears to have been established in the Menzala lagoon around the mid-first century BC. Its location and very peculiar installations indicate here a strategic harbor settlement located at the extremity of one of the Nile branches and once connected to a metropolis such as Mendes/ Thmouis or Sebennytos, which lie dozens of kilometers farther toward the center of the Delta. The site is currently threatened by the rapid progression of the cultivated areas, due to the regression of the water level in Lake Menzala (fig. 2). The difficulty of access is the only reason for its seemingly excellent state of preservation. But the site is severely endangered by the fast-changing landscape and the development of the agricultural crops. Therefore an extensive survey has become urgent in order to record non-invasively the archaeological remains from the surface without digging. The first survey season was conducted for a dozen days between September. 28 and October 8, 2015, under the direction of Gregory Marouard, Research Associate at the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago. This project was funded by the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago and an additional grant from the Egypt Exploration Society’s Delta Survey Program. Four team members participated in the fieldwork: Aude Simony (ceramicist, University of Poitiers), Robert Ryndziewicz (geomagnetic surveyor), Krzysztof Kiersnowski (geomagnetic surveyor), and Essam Nagy (archaeologist, fieldwork and engagement manager at the Egypt Exploration Society Cairo office). Inspector Ibrahim Ezzat Ibrahim Ghoneim and inspector Ahmed Ibrahim Abuseer rep- resented the Ministry of State for Antiquities. We would like to sincerely thank Mr. Sami Eid Salah Dohem, Director of the Damietta inspectorate, for his strong support and help in orga- nizing this first season at the site. An overview of the site was published in “Kom el-Dahab Interpreted,” Egyptian Archaeol- ogy 45 (2014): 25–27, and some results of the geomagnetic survey are presented in the current issue of the Oriental Institute News & Notes 231 (Autumn 2016), pp. 16–21. A Site Recently Rediscovered The introduction of high resolution and free online satellite images, such as Google Earth Pro, has allowed the discovery of many new sites or at least has helped to reveal new archaeologi- cal evidence at sites poorly known before. In 2011 a similar approach allowed us to re-evaluate the archaeological potential for Kom ed-Dahab. Despite being registered for many years by the Antiquities Service (no. 050105) and inven- toried by the Egypt Exploration Society Delta Survey (no. 321), the site was neither explored nor excavated by any archaeological mission. The only reference to it dates back to the inspec- tion conducted in the 1890s by Georges Foucart, who reports on the site without having ever visited it: “Tell el-Dahab, […] à six kilomètres environ de la limite des basses eaux […] dans la région de Damiette et ne contient, à ma connaissance, aucune espèce d’antiquités” (“Notes prises dans le Delta,” Recueil de Travaux relatifs à la Philologie et à la Archéologie Égyptiennes et Assyriennes 20 [1898]: 167; Annales du Service des Antiquités de l’Égypte 2 [1901]: 64). Another scholar, Albert Gayet, reported in his book Coins d’Égypte ignorés (1905) a very short descrip- tion of the Geziret-el-Dahab area and noted some antiquities and a possible function of the harbor, considering its location. 110 THE ORIENTAL INSTITUTE KOM ED-DAHAB Figure 2. Comparison of satellite views of the Kom ed-Dahab island from Corona (1969) and Google Earth (2011) showing the progression of the fields and the drying process of the lake during the last 40 years (after DigitalGlobe© and Corona) Only the satellite view of Kom ed-Dahab from 2011 shows on the surface extensive build- ing remains, streets, and major buildings (fig. 2). The most densely urbanized area, with a regular and strictly orthogonal plan, and a hippodamian grid on the eastern part, covers an area of about 350 m from southwest to northwest for at least 450 m (about 16 hectares). At the center of the urban area, an east–west orientated street clearly dominates the grid. It is much wider and extends without interruption over 450 m, leading at its eastern end to a large building, one of the most important ones on site. Except for a few holes from recent pillaging, some of which were made by using a bull- dozer, the surface of the site is totally intact. The two largest looting holes, on the southern part, reveal some water filling which emphasizes the low elevation of the island and the im- mediate vicinity of the water from Menzaleh Lake at shallow depths. The site seems to have been strongly affected by both rainwater and a probable increase in the level of the lake, as well as, possibly, tsunamis — perhaps one of the reasons for the abandonment of the site, which has caused a very homogeneous leveling of all the archaeological structures, totally invisible on the very flat surface. 2015–2016 ANNUAL REPORT 111 KOM ED-DAHAB Figure 3. Morning surface moisture bringing out Figure 4. Kite aerial view above the northwest- the limits of a house and streets at the corner of ern domestic area showing three Roman tower- a residential block (photo: G. Marouard) houses and the limits of the streets and residen- tial blocks (photo: G. Marouard) Kite Aerial Photography As a preliminary to the beginning of the geomagnetic survey, three series of aerial photog- raphy using a kite helped us to better illustrate the archaeological surface of the site before daily passage onto the surface produced dense circulation and visual pollution. Consisting of a time-lapse camera simply attached to a picavet suspension system and lifted by a traditional kite, the high-altitude pictures produced provide extremely valuable documentation for the areas that we expect to survey this season. Due to the variability of hygrometry on the surface (fig. 3) and the different kinds of building materials used for construction — such as red bricks, limestone blocks, and mud- bricks, each of which maintains moisture differently — the surface shows significant differ- ences in colors indicating the direction of the walls. As a result, the internal spaces inside the buildings, the streets, and sometimes the entire plan can be revealed for some important constructions. This operation was particularly successful for covering areas such as the main buildings already indicated by the satellite images in Zones 1, 2, and 5, and it helped us to better under- stand the urban organization and the street patterns of the complex domestic areas mostly located on the western part of the settlement (fig. 4). Geomagnetic Survey In 2015, an extensive investigation of the surface with a geomagnetic survey delivered much additional data and completed the excellent view of the site already available from the 2011 satellite pictures. The geomagnetic survey was conducted by the team of Tomach Herbich (Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology, Polish Academy of Sciences) represented this sea- son by Krzysztof Kiersnowski and Robert Ryndziewicz. This operation covered a cumulative surface of about 3.6 hectares (36,000 sq. m) in six different zones, which were surveyed using two Geoscan Research FM 256 Fluxgate Gradiometers (fig. 5). All these areas have been mapped with a total station in order to relocate the work on a general map (fig. 6). 112 THE ORIENTAL INSTITUTE KOM ED-DAHAB Zone 1 2 Area covered: 3,600 m (60 × 60 m) This sector, clearly visible on the satellite images of 2011 and fully covered by kite im- ages, revealed a massive rectangular con- struction measuring about 43 m long and 28 m wide. Located at the eastern extremity of the main axis of the town (470 m east–west), this major installation can be temporarily interpreted as a possible palatial building from the early Roman period, built with mudbricks and stones. The plan seems to be organized around a huge central peri- Figure 5. Ongoing geomagnetic survey along the style courtyard, beneath which a pipeline grid axes in Zone 3 (photo: G. Marouard) system made with red bricks seems to run westward. Zone 2 Area covered: 8,000 sq. m (100 × 80 m) This area seems to be mostly devoted to domestic installations, and the satellite images in- dicate here a strict orthogonal organization of the street layout.